Chapter 20: He Opened the Transparent World
The metal walkway cracked and fell, stirring up a cloud of dust.
This sound could not be completely concealed by the howling wind and rain. All the Iron Cross nearby unconsciously turned their gazes, and some approached directly, wanting to check the situation here.
After confirming with the corner of his eye that a red and white figure had entered the factory area under the cover of the commotion, Rast let out a subtle breath.
His gaze swept across the entire factory area, where dozens of Iron Cross had already been attracted by the noise, moving closer to Rast’s position.
But this was far from enough. His goal was to contain all the Iron Cross in the entire harbor area and minimize the risk of the time bomb being destroyed.
Moreover, those Iron Cross that he had gathered around the harbor area had now lost their target and were aimlessly wandering, likely to drift away from the harbor soon. Rast had to ensure that when the bomb exploded, all the Iron Cross were within the explosion’s core radius.
He set up the bipod of his sniper rifle, using the remains of the walkway to create a simple sniper position at a high spot.
During their previous escape, Rast and Hiltina had to keep moving at all times. This heavy weapon was far less flexible and convenient than a handgun. But now, what he had to do was not escape, but intercept and obstruct, which was precisely the best scenario for his sniper rifle.
Rast set the pocket watch to countdown mode and took out the Evil God sculpture.
Swish—
The diamond-shaped dagger flickered and disappeared. Rast cut open his vein again with the dagger, and dark red bl**d splattered in midair, falling on the bound human-shaped sculpture.
He threw the Evil God sculpture with force before raising his handgun to aim.
The pollutant traced a parabolic arc in the air, and as it reached its highest point, Rast’s b*llet hit it perfectly. The bloodstained sculpture immediately trembled violently in midair, emitting a buzzing sound.
Invisible biological waves emanated from the sculpture as a source point, radiating towards the entire harbor area and even Deep Blue Harbor.
Ordinary people and other beings could not perceive this wave, but the wave acted like a command, issuing orders in the minds of every Iron Cross in Deep Blue Harbor.
Every Iron Cross that received the wave stopped its current actions and sprinted wildly towards the depths of the harbor, their synchronized movements even causing the ground to shake, as if thousands of horses were galloping.
Clap.
As he fired his weapon, Rast pressed the button on his pocket watch, and the second hand began to tick slowly.
A countdown of 25 minutes began.
……
The rain fell even harder, and the sound of rain mixed with the increasingly near sound of running and the unique insane laughter of the Iron Cross.
Rast remained motionless, crouched in front of the sniper rifle, with the diamond-shaped dagger stained with his bl**d beside him. He did not bandage his wrist again as he had before, but the wound in his wrist was visibly stopping the bleeding and healing.
The mixed serum he injected earlier granted Rast self-healing abilities close to that of the Iron Cross, but the cost was that he would d*e from organ failure in two hours. The accelerated circulation and metabolism caused Rast’s body temperature to rise, and raindrops falling on his hot body evaporated, turning into white mist that scattered with the wind.
Through the scope, the rain-drenched world was reflected. In such a downpour and mist, a person thirty meters away was merely a vague shadow. Even aiming with the n*ked eye became exceedingly difficult, let alone using an optical scope to locate enemies at distances of over a hundred meters.
Yet Rast continued to aim, calculate, and make fine adjustments to the muzzle.
He loaded a pointed b*llet into the chamber of the sniper rifle.
This rifle employed a single-shot, rear-loading design. After each shot, the chamber had to be opened to remove the spent shell and insert a new b*llet. However, sacrificing the ability for rapid-fire brought tremendous power per shot; each b*llet could take down an adult bison.
Only with this kind of sniper rifle could he pair it with pointed bullets to penetrate the vital steel membranes of the Iron Cross from a distance of a hundred meters.
As the sound of the b*llet being chambered echoed, Rast fell completely silent.
In proportion to his rising body temperature, the light in his eyes cleared, and the surrounding world seemed to freeze all at once, the sound of rain abruptly stopping.
Calming the ripples of thought, not only sound but emotions were sealed away as well.
In just a few seconds, Rast’s spirit resonated completely with the surrounding environment, merging, ultimately becoming one.
This was the same flow state that Hiltina had previously entered; only Hiltina relied on her Night Blade to achieve that state, while Rast depended on pure experience—an unparalleled proficiency.
He had been partnered with this sniper rifle for over two hundred years; human civilization’s earliest sniper rifles had likely not existed for even two hundred years.
Due to the reset, Rast could not enhance his physical capabilities through training. All he could do was continually hone his skills and spirit, pushing many techniques to unprecedented heights over the course of several hundred years.
Entering a flow state was a rare find for ordinary people, but for Rast, it only required a mental cue; the sound of the b*llet being chambered was the switch he set for himself.
The sound of rain vanished, the world fell silent, and time slowed.
Rast’s “temperature” governed this sniper rifle, the surrounding terrain, and the entire world within the scope’s view.
He pulled the trigger, the b*llet left the chamber, and a flash of gunfire erupted.
In the real world, there was no hit feedback like in gunfight games, but Rast knew that a fellow Iron Cross using the sniper rifle was shot through the heart amid the rain, with a faint sound of a heavy object hitting the ground echoing through the rain.
Rast slowly rotated the muzzle, chambered another round, and fired again…
This mechanical process was repeated six times by Rast, with each shot resulting in the d*ath of an Iron Cross sniper, their screams ringing out at nearly equal intervals.
After firing the sixth shot, Rast suddenly tilted to the side, and in the next moment, a steel-core b*llet pierced the steel plate behind him.
In mid-tilt, Rast aimed again, fired, and ended the life of the seventh Iron Cross sniper.
This was not a fair sniper duel; the torrential rain obscured the view through the scope, making each Iron Cross sniper effectively blind in these conditions. The seventh one’s counterattack relied on the sacrifice of the previous six Iron Cross, who had roughly narrowed down Rast’s position based on the sound of gunfire.
But Rast understood that the rain would lessen in a minute, and at that point, these snipers would become his greatest threat, so he chose to eliminate these hazards in advance.
If this were an FPS game from Rast’s past life, his shots fired without information, unable to see the enemy’s blind shot, would quickly be branded as “hacks,” named “Transparent World,” and swiftly banned. But what Rast accomplished was not due to visual clarity.
In the previous cycles, Rast had successfully reached the harbor over eight thousand times, and he had also died over eight thousand times. Such an immense amount of experience allowed him to complete nearly impossible feats—
He understood every weapon and firearm carried by each Iron Cross in the harbor, their movement patterns, trajectories… even the various disturbances that heavy rain and strong winds could cause to sniper trajectories at different moments.
Even if Rast’s perspective contained nothing, he had meticulously comprehended all details within the harbor, allowing him to achieve one-shot kills.
Rast did not possess x-ray vision, but in a sense, he was more terrifying than someone with such ability, as x-ray vision could not account for b*llet drop and wind deviation.
(End of Chapter)
